Series: Waste to Local Businesses
The Illusion of the Green Bin
For decades, we’ve been told that if we rinse it, sort it, and drop it in the green bin, we’ve done our part. Recycling, we were assured, would close the loop — transforming waste back into new products while protecting the planet.
But for small communities like ours, the story doesn’t end where people think it does. Behind the cheerful arrows of the recycling symbol lies a complex system of fluctuating markets, long-haul transport, and limited local capacity. Many items collected with the best of intentions simply don’t make it back into the cycle.
I know this firsthand. For more than eleven years, I was the operator of our local recycling centre. I saw every bale and bin come through the gates — the good, the bad, and the wishful. Some materials had strong local or regional buyers: clean cardboard, aluminum, and high-grade plastics often found a home. Others were a constant struggle — glass too heavy to ship, low-grade plastics with no market, and mixed paper that sat waiting for a buyer that never came.
What people didn’t see was the cost of keeping that promise of “recycling.” Sorting, baling, trucking, and storage all carried a price tag, and when markets collapsed. Unfortunately some of those materials were quietly redirected to landfill. Not for lack of effort — but because the system was never built for the realities of small-town recycling.
When Recycling Isn’t Circular
The truth is that recycling, as we’ve known it, depends on distance. It relies on somewhere else to take what we’ve sorted. When those “somewhere elses” disappear — when mills close, or buyers tighten quality standards — local recycling becomes storage, not sustainability. Our Glass is a good example.
And yet, every load that passes through the gate represents something more than waste. It’s material, energy, and potential. It’s the makings of small-scale manufacturing, of maker projects, of local jobs waiting to be built from the very items we currently discard.
That realization changed how I thought about waste entirely. Instead of chasing the global market, I began to imagine what it would look like if we kept it here — if we transformed our community waste streams into resources for local innovation.
The Spark Behind Sustainable Life
That idea became the foundation of what I now call Sustainable Life, part of which evolved into work on the Sustainable Living Centre (SLC) — a non-profit I envisioned to explore exactly these possibilities. The SLC was meant to be more than a depot; it was an incubator for ideas. A place where locals, students, and makers could experiment with materials, build prototypes, and develop green jobs rooted in real community needs.
While the SLC hasn’t as yet unfolded exactly as was first envisioned, the concept never left. I realized that sometimes the best way forward is to build independently, with the flexibility to experiment and evolve. Through Sustainable Life, I’m continuing that mission — showing that a small community can lead the way in local circular economy innovation.
The Waste to Local Businesses Series
This series, Waste to Local Businesses, picks up where that vision began. Each article will look at one part of our community waste stream and re-imagine what it could become when we bring the process home.
- Glass: From breakage to building blocks — turning bottles into local sand, tiles, or art.
- Plastics: From problem to product — shredding, melting, and remolding into usable goods.
- Textiles: From fast fashion to durable reuse — repairing, reweaving, and repurposing fabric.
- Wood and Organics: From scrap to soil — biochar, compost, and reclaimed materials.
- Metals and E-Waste: From junk to function — repair, parts recovery, and creative reuse.
Each one of these represents both a challenge and an opportunity. When handled collectively — through Trade Days, Repair Cafés, Foothills Makers, and youth projects — they can spark real change, one stream at a time.
Beyond Recycling: Building Local Resilience
True circularity isn’t about sorting things into the right bin — it’s about designing systems where nothing is wasted in the first place. It’s about creating loops within our own community that capture material, energy, and knowledge before they leave town.
Imagine students learning business and environmental science by running a small plastics-recycling micro-factory. Or volunteers turning old glass into landscape materials for pollinator gardens. Or wood waste transformed into biochar that helps our drought-prone soils hold more water.
This isn’t theory. It’s what communities around the world are starting to do — and what we can do here.
A Call to Local Action
If we want to build a resilient Diamond Valley, we can’t rely on distant markets or promises that end at the curb. We need local hands-on solutions that generate jobs, skills, and pride.
The green bin was a good start — but it’s time to move beyond it.
This series is about showing how.
If you’ve ever wondered where your recycling really goes — and how it could stay right here creating local opportunity — join us on this journey.
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